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I'm reasonably certain the em dash is more common than the en dash in American publications. But which of the two is more common in British publications?

tchrist
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BloodyCurious
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  • How do you know that the em dash is more common in the US? I know commentators tend to sing its praises compared to the en-dash, but I feel like I've seen the latter more in student writing, and I don't have the first clue for how to figure out common typographies. – TaliesinMerlin May 02 '19 at 16:36
  • According to Google the term "em dash" is more common than "en dash" in British English https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=em+dash%2Cen+dash&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=18&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cem%20dash%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Cen%20dash%3B%2Cc0 Does this mean that the em dash symbol is also more common? – David D May 02 '19 at 16:37
  • @TaliesinMerlin Wikipedia says so at least: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dash#En_dash_versus_em_dash – BloodyCurious May 02 '19 at 16:48
  • @David Not the term, the actual dash. – BloodyCurious May 02 '19 at 16:49
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    @TaliesinMerlin In student writing, I suspect the en dash is more common everywhere since MS Word, in which the majority of writing is done these days, auto-corrects a spaced (or double) hyphen to an en dash. Em dashes require more typographic savviness. In actual typeset contexts, though, the em dash is definitely more common in AmE than in BrE. – Janus Bahs Jacquet May 02 '19 at 16:56
  • @JanusBahsJacquet Do you also happen to know which is more common in actual typeset contexts in British English? – BloodyCurious May 02 '19 at 17:00
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    @BloodyCurious I would say the en dash is more common there, but I’m less categorically certain of that. A quick glance through some UK-printed novels in my bookcase shows en dashes in all of them. – Janus Bahs Jacquet May 02 '19 at 17:01
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    @JanusBahsJacquet Bringhurst talks about this; spaced en dash is normal in the Commonwealth. – tchrist May 02 '19 at 17:12
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    The great advantage of using en-dashes as separators for clauses is that you never have to use an em-dash again – so you don't need to clutter your mind with rules about when you should use which. – Peter Shor May 02 '19 at 17:30
  • @PeterShor I actually very much like the em dash and think everyone should use it. :P The en dash has different purposes, and I consider using it in place of the em dash a modern absurdity that screws with the aesthetics of the English language. If I could, I would also introduce it in my mother tongue, which unfortunately doesn't use it at all. – BloodyCurious May 02 '19 at 17:47
  • @BloodyCurious In a comment above, you linked to a Wikipedia article as 'evidence' that "the em dash is more common than the en dash in American English". I've looked through that Wikipedia article and can't find that said anywhere (altho' I may have overlooked it). Please clarify. – TrevorD May 02 '19 at 18:03
  • @TrevorD "Dashes have been cited as being treated differently in the US and the UK, with the former preferring the use of an em dash with no additional spacing and the latter preferring a spaced en dash." I suspected it's true that the em dash is more common in AE as most of my English books are from American publishers and use em dashes, but I wasn't sure (my bookshelf isn't a representative sample), and certainly not about BE. – BloodyCurious May 02 '19 at 18:37
  • @BloodyCurious Thanks - I had seen that and hadn't taken in what it said!! The source cited in Wikipedia dates back to 2010, and thinks could, of course, have changed since then. I don't know how one can really establish either way, unless someone has done some research. Personally (as a Brit), I use the em-dash more, but I probably see the en-dash used more. As others have said, this could be largely because the en-dash / hyphen is more readily typed than the em-dash. ... – TrevorD May 02 '19 at 19:15
  • ... As others have hinted, there is also a difference between the dashes being 'spaced' or not - personally I prefer them spaced, but often see them un-spaced. But unless someone has access to relevant statistics, I don't see how you can a reliable answer to the question, as opposed to mere 'impressions'. – TrevorD May 02 '19 at 19:17
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    @BloodyCurious: in the 19th century, there was only one type of dash in English—the em dash. Then printers started using en-dashes for ranges, like 10–12, because they thought it looked better. So having two different types of dashes is actually the modern absurdity (for a slightly different definition of modern). ;-) – Peter Shor May 02 '19 at 21:27
  • It is odd to ask whether em or en dashes are more common, given that, among those who regularly use both, they have different purposes. The real question seems to be: in the situations in which em dashes could be used, is it more common to use em dashes or some other device that serves the same purpose as em dashes? – jsw29 Aug 17 '20 at 19:23
  • I’m voting to close this question because this is a badly formulated question about the statistical occurrence of a character in an unknown context. – David Sep 10 '22 at 18:07
  • Using Google Trends we can look for occurrences of em and en dashes in search queries. This provides an interesting (but limited) usage comparison. Presumably, users copy and paste search queries containing these characters, rather than typing them in manually. Use of en dashes is significantly greater, even in US. https://trends.google.co.uk/trends/explore?date=all&geo=GB&q=%E2%80%94,%E2%80%93 – Charles Roper Sep 11 '22 at 03:10

2 Answers2

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This is a matter of style, so it's not possible to give a definitive answer on what the correct use is. Different style guides, and different people, will use dashes in different ways.

Having said that, it's generally been the case that more British style guides will say to not use an em dash but, where US style would use an em dash, to use an en dash that's surrounded by spaces.

From the University of Oxford Style Guide (PDF), page 13:

m-dash (—)
Do not use; use an n-dash instead.

n-dash (–)
Use in a pair in place of round brackets or commas, surrounded by spaces.
      ✔ It was – as far as I could tell – the only example of its kind.
      ✔ The library – which was built in the seventeenth century – needs to be repaired.

Use singly and surrounded by spaces to link two parts of a sentence, in place of a colon.
      ✔ The bus was late today – we nearly missed the lecture.

Use to link concepts or ranges of numbers, with no spaces either side.
      ✔ German–Polish non-aggression pact
      ✔ The salary for the post is £25,000–£30,000.
      ✔ Radio 1 is aimed at the 18–25 age bracket.

Use between names of joint authors/creators/performers etc to distinguish from hyphenated names of a single person.
      ✔ Lennon–McCartney compositions
      ✔ Superman–Batman crossover comics

Note that the guidance here to not use the em dash goes against the guidance of most US-based style guides. (But also note that the use of the en dash recommended in the last two categories—without a surrounding space—does match the use of the en dash recommended by most US style guides.)

But that is only one of the common style guides used in the UK—and many companies and people in the UK do use em dashes. So, it should not be thought of as definitive. As with other aspects of style, pick the style guide that is being used by your audience. If there isn't one, then pick the one you like—or make up your own style sheet from a combination of style guides. Just be consistent.

Community
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Jason Bassford
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  • That is interesting. – MikeJRamsey56 May 03 '19 at 18:49
  • Good answer. I edit a lot of manuscripts (in English) from authors outside North America, and I have noticed a strong preference for " – " [en dash with letter spaces on either side] over "—" [closed-up em dash] among British English writers, in particular. The U.S. English preference (reinforced by Chicago and AP) is for the closed-up em dash. – Sven Yargs May 03 '19 at 18:57
  • How does one particular publisher’s style guide possibly answer this question? – David Sep 10 '22 at 18:08
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many companies and people in the UK do use em dashes.

Have you got any examples? I don't have any hard data, but as a British designer with 30 years' experience, I would judge that it is a minority of companies and people in the UK that use em dashes. To my eyes, they make a text look American – they imbue the text with an American accent, if you will. I suspect those that use an em dash for British audiences either do so unknowingly, or have a particularly international audience. But I've noticed that even British publications with a US edition use spaced en dashes, such as The Guardian. E.g., this from an article by Edwin Rios, senior reporter at the Guardian US:

The possibility came to light in May when the Georgia State University professor Nick Wilding expressed “serious doubts about its authenticity”. Wilding found while researching Nicotra – who had a “forgery factory” in his Milan apartment – that the counterfeiter had “reportedly started selling fake letters and musical manuscripts to support seven mistresses”, the New York Times reported.

Charles Roper
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